Case Study

Working With Kimberly-Clark: Battling Colds and Flu, Digitally

Kimberly-Clark is a renowned personal care company and the maker of globally popular products like Kleenex and Scott tissues and Huggies diapers, among a diverse range of brands and products for all age groups. The company was founded in 1870 and presently employs 58,000 people in 37 countries. Its leading brands are sold in more than 175 countries with nearly one-quarter of the world’s population purchasing a Kimberly-Clark product every day. The company reported sales of $21.1 billion in 2012.

Partnering with a Leader in Personal Care

Software in Practice
– Adobe Photoshop
– Microsoft Visual Basic and .Net
– Flash
– Wireframe
– HTML
– CSS
– MVC
– ELMAH
– GhostDoc
– NUnit
– dotCoverGraphicPeople worked with Kimberly-Clark for a digital marketing campaign for one of the world’s most well known tissue brands, Kleenex®. Kleenex® Everyday Tissues was planning a marketing campaign in the flu prone season of November for the US and Canadian markets. The digital campaign promised to be a unique one, spreading knowledge about tackling colds and flu by getting the customer involved with an interactive website that could help predict a visitor’s vulnerability to colds and flu based on location. Given its track record for digital excellence with leading global brands and agencies, GraphicPeople was invited to develop this website, and another one on Kleenex® Everyday Tissues, as well as other conventional collaterals.

Work Cut Out

Development of an interactive web application to predict visitor’s vulnerability to cold and flu based on location; development of informational Kleenex® website, Flash banners and electronic direct mailers (EDMs), for two countries in three languages.

Fighting Colds and Flu Digitally: The Challenge

This project involved several agencies working together under the WPP umbrella and so maintaining a clear channel of communication and effectively coordinating across different levels of management was a challenge for project managers on all sides.

“Whenever you have multiple, large stakeholders, it adds to the existing technical, logistical and feedback-related complexities of the project” explains Sahariar Hannan Jitu, Director of Digital Production at GraphicPeople.

“You have to manage expectations from everyone.”

Furthermore, it was not just about creating a website. The expert team at GraphicPeople had to fully understand the client’s existing technical infrastructure and backend systems that would host the interactive application and the conventional product website so that there were no compatibility issues down the road. This exercise involved carefully reviewing the client’s entire web hosting platform, navigating complex core technologies and strictly adhering to a number of dos and don’ts.

“This was probably one of the most challenging projects to date for GraphicPeople” admits Jitu

How GraphicPeople Helped

Benefits Delivered
– The digital team’s diversity and experience made it possible to quickly address the complexities of hosting new applications on client’s existing platform that used customized infrastructure and hosting protocols.
– Client received round-the-clock customer support for web application and website.
– GraphicPeople’s digital expertise added value to client’s creative idea and produced a unique way through which the public could be informed about colds and flu.A large team of experienced digital experts was deployed to analyze the client’s existing web hosting technology and begin application development. This 8-member team comprised of software architects, senior .Net developers, front-end developers, QA engineers and senior project managers. The team worked in three shifts and the workflow was segmented into three parts taking time zone advantage into consideration: the first two daytime shifts focused on development while the third shift (corresponding to commencement of office hours in the US) focused on deployment and client communication. Multiple stakeholders meant that effective communication management was also important across the multiple agencies involved. The GraphicPeople team worked closely on strategy with Adpeople colleagues as well as interacting with the client side for defining appropriate technology, functionality and solutions for the two websites. Everyone’s efforts paid off in the end with the project going on to win a People’s Choice Award.

Results Delivered

Three thousand man-hours later GraphicPeople developed a predictive web application, a conventional website, more than 50 Flash banners and 10 EDMs for the US and Canadian markets in English, French and Spanish. The web application was designed to predict the vulnerability of website visitors to colds and flu given their location in the US and Canada with up to 88% accuracy. The application used Center for Disease Control (CDC) data, bird migration patterns and social chatter to predict the probability of a person getting afflicted. This website, named Achoo, was deployed alongside an informational website of Kleenex® Everyday Tissues. The latter, complete with an administrator backend system, highlighted the benefits of Kleenex® Everyday Tissues as a trusted partner for the flu season, tips on tackling colds and flu, and providing a promotional coupon to purchase the product. GraphicPeople was also recognized in the international awards circles for this project: the Achoo web application won the People’s Choice Award in the Health/Wellness/Pharmaceutical category at the 18th Annual Webby Awards. The Achoo site increased customer purchase intent by more than 11% and buzz in the social media by 289%.

“Being part of a campaign for a brand which touches the lives of millions of people everyday reaffirms GraphicPeople’s presence in the global marketing and advertising space” says Imtiaz Ilahi, Managing Director of GraphicPeople, “Winning a Webby Award speaks to the expertise of the talented digital team in Dhaka…and shows how colds and flu can be fought digitally!”